On her past costumes and eccentric ensembles: "It was sort of like a very polite 'F*ck off.' It was never about looking perfect — it was always about just being myself. And I think that's what it's always been about for my fans, too. It was a form of protection, and a secret — like a wink from afar. I'm a monster, and you're a monster too.
On the past decade of her life: "There has been a galaxy of change . . . I would just say that it's been a nonstop whirlwind. And when I am in an imaginative or creative mode, it sort of grabs me like a sleigh with a thousand horses and pulls me away and I just don't stop working. . . . You . . . make friends, you lose friends, you build tighter bonds with people you've known for your whole life. But there's a lot of emotional pain, and you can't really understand what it all means until ten years has gone by."
On her evolving image: "For me, fashion and art and music have always been a form of armor. I just kept creating more and more fantasies to escape into, new skins to shed. And every time I shed a skin, it was like taking a shower when you're dirty: getting rid of, washing off, shedding all of the bad, and becoming something new."